There are many examples of using heated rollers in the art. For example, in U.S. Patent Application No. 2005/0056297, a hair clip is heated while it is secured to a hot roller, where heat is to be transferred from the roller to the clip when attached to the heating unit, for the purpose of aiding the roller in heating the hair that has been wrapped around that roller. This is different from the invention. The clips in '297 are unable to be heated on their own, and '297 does not claim any use as a styling tool apart from aiding the roller that heats them. With the present invention, the actual hair styling clip will be heated on its own, for the primary purpose of being used as the styling tool.
In addition to styling the hair into a scrunched look, the invention's heated hairstyling clips can be used to aid in the use of styling with any concave roller/curler that can be used with heat. The heated hairstyling clips, when desired for the purpose of aiding in roller styling, can be purchased and used with almost any roller/curler the consumer already has, while giving the consumer many other styling options which can be achieved when using them on their own as well.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,294,777 discloses the use of a hair clip that includes a pair of interior metal plates that are heated by applying them to an electric heating unit. These heated hair clips are used to style dry or damp hair into a linear configuration generally perpendicular to the scalp. These heated hair clips have only a limited use for producing lift and volume at the root of the hair; they cannot be used to secure a hair curler/roller or to create styles resulting in scrunched styles, waves or curls throughout the entire hair strand.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,522,407 discloses a heatable hair clip having flat plate faces that is used with a U-shaped hair curler and a small clip to hold the hair on the curler as a method of curling hair. Hair is configured onto the U-shaped hair curler, a small clip is used to hold the hair in place on the curler, and the heated clip is then placed over the curler and small clip to set the hair. An electric heating unit is used to heat the heatable plates of the clips until they are applied to the hair. It is stated in '407 that these clips can be used with other curlers, or be applied directly to the hair. This may be true, but with great limitation because of the structure of the clip. These clips are not capable of being used in the same manner as the present invention, due to their flat, perpendicular shape. They lack the ability to aid the average circular roller/curler with securing and styling the hair, and they certainly lack the ability to produce the scrunched finished looks, due to their flat interior, as well as due to the pattern of the hair inside the assembled device.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,949,766 describes a clip which holds a flat heated spool in one jaw and presses hair between the heated spool and the other flat clip jaw. It is incapable of providing the scrunched look.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,849,593 provides roller cartridges that can be heated in a microwave and used to roll up hair to set it into curls. Optionally, the cartridges can be carried inside a curling-iron type of device. The objective is to heat hair without having electricity present in the device, but the physical form is still not useful for the scrunched or informal look.
Although some of the hair configurations intended to be achieved using the present invention require some skill from the user, the method of styling is still easier and quicker than that of the prior art. But more importantly, the main intention of the present invention is to achieve the natural look of tousled, scrunched hair, and that cannot be achieved using any of the prior art devices. In contrast, with the present invention, it is possible for any user to achieve scrunched and similar informal styles simply and quickly.